At $123,000, Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski’s (Polish, 1849-1915) “The Hunt,” oil on board, signed lower right achieved the highest price in the sale, tripling the high end of its $20/40,000 estimate.
Review By Kiersten Busch
CLEVELAND, OHIO — On October 19, Rachel Davis Fine Arts conducted its 265th sale, Fine Art at Auction. The sale, which realized $615,000, featured 410 lots of fine art, prominently featuring the art of northeast Ohio. “Overall, it was a good sale,” shared Megumi Yamazoe, office manager at Rachel Davis.
“The bids were primarily from the United States, but several lots are going to China and several to Europe,” said Yamazoe, when elaborating on the bidding pool.
Leading the sale was an oil on board painting by the Polish artist Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski, titled “The Hunt.” Measuring 19 by 15 inches framed, it had provenance to a private collection from Bath, Ohio. More than tripling its $20/40,000 estimate, the painting, depicting a red-coated man on horseback with hunting dogs in the foreground, galloped to a $123,000 finish; it will have a new home with a Canadian buyer.
Securing the second-highest price of the sale was an untitled painting by American artist David Diao, which, for $41,600, is headed to China. Measuring 66 by 88 inches, the acrylic and collage on canvas was painted with various tones of yellow and orange and had provenance to the Seville, Ohio, collection of Rory and Dedee O’Neil.
This untitled acrylic and collage on canvas by David Diao (American, b 1943), with provenance to the O’Neil collection of Seville, Ohio, made $41,600, the second-highest total of the sale ($20/30,000).
“Continual Overlay” by Julian Stanczak rounded out the top three best-selling lots of the sale, finishing with a glowing $36,900 thanks to a Cleveland buyer. The acrylic on canvas was completed in 1979 and had provenance to the Cleveland Art Association, where it was a gift from the artist and his wife, Barbara. According to the auction catalog, the proceeds from the sale of “Continual Overlay” will benefit the Julian Stanczak Scholarship at the Cleveland Institute of Art. Three other Stanczak works were included in the sale, with two of the three finding new homes with buyers. “Sixteen Balls in Green” earned $832, while an untitled silkscreen with geometric forms sold for $768.
Seventeen works of sculpture were on offer, led by “Jupiter as a Bull” by American artist Donald DeLue. Stampeding past its $7/10,000 estimate, the bronze sculpture was won by a Holly Hill, Fla., buyer for $16,640. A separate cast of “Jupiter as a Bull” appeared in D. Roger Howlett’s The Sculpture of Donald DeLue: Gods, Prophets and Heroes (Boston, 1990), but this example had provenance to the Canton Museum of Art in Canton, Ohio.
Rachel Davis’s next auction will be Prints & Drawings and Decorative Arts, which will take place on December 7.
Prices quoted include buyer’s premium as reported by the auction house. For information, www.racheldavisfinearts.com or 216-939-1190.
